1. Field of Technology
The present disclosure relates to endoscopic imaging systems.
2. Related Art
Medical endoscopic imaging systems are used in surgical procedures to inspect regions of interest within a patient's body, such as, for example, cavities and joints, through a small incision. In general, an endoscopic imaging system includes an endoscope, a camera head attached to the endoscope, a remote light source tethered to the endoscope via a fiber optic cable, and a camera control unit coupled to the camera head via a power and data cable.
The endoscope includes a rigid or flexible elongated insertion tube that is inserted into the patient's body such that the distal tip of the insertion tube is positioned at the region of interest. The insertion tube defines one or more illumination channel(s) for transmitting light received from the remote light source to the region of interest to illuminate the region of interest. The insertion tube also defines an imaging channel for relaying an image of the region of interest to an image sensor in the camera head.
Typically, for the rigid insertion tube, the illumination channels contain an incoherent fiber optic bundle that extends through the channels, and the imaging channel contains an objective lens followed by one or more rod lenses positioned adjacent to each other in series or a coherent fiber bundle that relays the image formed by the objective lens to the focusing assembly. For the flexible insertion tube, the tube includes an imaging channel that houses an objective lens and a coherent fiber bundle, and one or more illumination channels located adjacent to the imaging channel that house incoherent optical fiber bundles for illumination.
A focusing assembly housed within the endoscope includes optics that can be manipulated by the surgeon to focus the image on the image sensor located in the camera head.
The camera head receives the image of the region of interest from the focusing assembly of the endoscope, converts the image into electronic data, and transmits the data over the power and data cable to the camera control unit for processing. The image is then transmitted by the camera control unit to a display unit that is coupled to the camera control unit. The camera head uses the power and data cable to both receive power and to communicate with the external camera control unit.